Let's just say it was one of those things that if you weren't moved completely to tears, you have no soul.
Here's a copy and paste from
InterCot
EDIT -- Helps if you play the music while you read it....
Female Announcer: Attention travelers. Please remain seated. Your vehicle is rotating backwards for your return to earth.
Jeremy Irons: Physical distance is no longer a barrier to communication. Today, the entire world is our next door neighbor. Our news is their news, their news ours. We share our hopes and concerns with the whole planet. We truly live in a Global Neighborhood.
We pass below a large TV screen that displays news clips from around the world. Every 10 seconds or so, the image switches to a different anchor from a different part of the world. In October 2000, the video images were updated to remove references to President Clinton and include images from the 2000 Presidential Debates with candidates Gore and Bush.
Jeremy Irons: Wondrous new tools will help us learn more about ourselves, each other, and the planet we share. Spaceship Earth will become our virtual classroom.
Up to the left of the vehicles, a large screen sits behind a teacher and three students. They are discussing several ideas and as each is mentioned, it appears on the screen by use of a computer. In September 1999, the video image was updated to include the English words being spoken and included two smaller video conferences with classes in Madrid and Brazil.
Teacher: The assignment was to create an Earth spider.
Girl 1: We need some way to explore it.
Boy: How about a flying car?
Girl 1: Try a flying butterfly?
Girl 2: It could be a bee.
Boy: Ever see bees building a hive?
Girl 2: Okay, let's make a beehive.
Teacher: Why not try a dragonfly?
Girl 1: What for?
Teacher: For a space shuttle.
Girl 2: Awesome!
Girl 1: First we need to shorten his wings.
Boy: And change his body shape.
Teacher: Let's see what you can do with an alien planet.
Boy: Mars!
Girl 1: Let's have a robotics bee vehicle.
Girl 2: Yeah, to move through the bee's hive.
Boy: Those are fireflies!
Teacher: This is excellent.
Girl 1: We're going in!
Girl 2: We're underwater!
Boy: There's no water in space.
Teacher: The assignment was to create an Earth spider. (loop)
Jeremy Irons: As we greet the 21st century, yet another revolution in communication is upon us - as profound as all the progress that has come before. By using our new communication tools to build better bridges between us, we will discover we all share the common bonds of hope and sorrow, dreams and joys.
On the right, we pass clouds, a star field, and an occasional lightning strike. The vehicles, still descending backwards, pass four dioramas each depicting how telecommunications will help people around the world stay closer together. The first one shows a girl talking with her mom via video phone. The daughter is sitting in bed with her father's arms around her shoulders. The mother is in another place like a hotel.
Mother: Goodnight, sweetheart.
Daughter: Goodnight, mommy, I miss you.
Mother: I miss you too.
Daughter: Can you sing my song one more time? Please?
Mother: Of course.
Mother & Daughter singing: Hush a bye
Don't you cry
Go to sleep
Our little baby (loop)
Dr. Nap receives her diploma while her grandparents are watching her via video phone from their home.
Professor: Juanita Nap, Doctor of Clinical Psychology and class valedictorian! (clapping) Congratulations Dr. Nap.
Dr. Juanita Nap: Thank you, Professor, and thank you all my fellow classmates. This means so much to me! And especially to grandma and grandpa who couldn't be here! I did it! I did it! Thank you. (loop)
The third diorama shows a pregnant mother in a hospital bed. A nurse is assisting the woman's doctor (who is at another location but is directing the nurse via video phone) with taking a sonogram. The mother's husband stands next to their son as the boy is talking to his mother's doctor.
Tommy: Can we you see, Dr.?
Doctor: Well, this is not exactly what any of us expected.
The doctor shows the sonogram of the womb and they see that there is more than one baby.
Tommy: Is my baby brother okay doctor?
Doctor: Surprise Tommy, your baby sister is doing just fine. Congratulations, Mr. and Mrs. [Hawkins?], you have beautiful, healthy baby twins on the way!
Tommy: When will they be here?
Doctor: Let me take a look. I think you'll only have to wait another three more months. (loop)
The last diorama depicts an archeologist showing his fellow scientists what he has found at the site. This screen was also updated in September 1999 like the other ones earlier in that it contains both the English and Spanish translations.
Man: From the hologram, it looks like a full mandible.
Eddy: It is. Except for this. How'd you like to get bit by a set of these babies! Their cranial structure's almost perfect!
Woman: Es increible. Felicidades, Eduardo. [It's incredible. Congratulations, Edward.]
Man: Great, Eddy. It's more than we ever hoped for.
These four dioramas are followed by two small sculpted scenes. The first shows a person in a cave reviewing diagrams and the second shows a woman in the jungle. Both are sending information through the network to the vast, fiber optics filled, modern city on the waterfront beyond. Fiber optic lights spread away from the city up and over the vehicles.
Jeremy Irons: Since the dawn of recorded time, communication has revolutionized our lives and changed our world. We now have the ability and the responsibility to build new bridges of acceptance and co-operation between us; to create a better world for ourselves and our children as we continue our amazing journey aboard Spaceship Earth.
The fiber optic strands join into one line of lights that curves from the upper left over us and around a model of
Spaceship Earth on the right. That line ends with little points of light coming out of it. From there, three solid lines that criss-cross above us change colors as we continue to work our way to the base of the geosphere. Those lights end at a sign that has the AT&T logo and says "Bringing people together anytime, anywhere."
The original final announcement went like this:
Female Announcer: AT&T thanks your for traveling with us. At AT&T, we are dedicated to bringing people together providing you with easy access to each other and the information you want and need anytime and anywhere. We now invite you to sample the future of communication in AT&T's Global Neighborhood. Your vehicle doors will open automatically. Please gather your belongings and watch your step on the moving platform.
That was changed to the following sometime during late 1996/early 97:
Female Announcer: AT&T thanks you for traveling with us on the superhighway of communications. We are dedicated to bringing people together providing you with easy access to each other and the information you want and need anytime, anywhere. We invite you now to preview the future of communications at the AT&T Global Neighborhood. And then at Innoventions, discover how AT&T is turning tomorrow's visions into reality today. Your vehicle doors will open automatically. Please gather your belongings and watch your step on the moving platform.
That was changed to the following in November 1999:
Female Announcer: May I have your attention please! Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, you are approaching the New Global Neighborhood. Now that you've seen the future, we invite you to experience it yourself. Soon your vehicle doors will open automatically, please gather your belongings and watch your step on the moving platform. Then, walk through the portal to AT&T's New Global Neighborhood and a whole new way to communicate. Come on, I'll meet you there!
To say the least....SSE's 1994-2006 ending was one of the most heartfelt, most inspirational pieces that Walt Disney Imagineering ever dreamed up. Made me bawl like a baby every time, then want to go back and ride it all again.
The current finale is just....meh.
